Not My Way

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways" declares the Lord. Isaiah 55:8

It's so easy to make plans for the future. To picture what I want, or where I want to be in 5 or 10 years. It's easy to see what I want my life to become. I can see all the choices I need to make to get that picture.

But God doesn't always let me have my picture.

Sometimes, his picture and my picture are drastically different. I don't always like the strokes His paintbrushes take. The colors may be too dark. The picture isn't pretty as it's being painted.

If I had it my way, there would be no sufferring. All the colors of my picture would be bright and beautiful.

But His ways aren't my ways. And I thank Him for that. Because those strokes that I thought were too long, too dark, too hard...those were the strokes that created the contrast to make the rest of the picture more beautiful. A picture more beautiful than anything than I could create on my own.

I think of the sun. In the daytime, it's bright, at night, it's gone. There is nothing special. But at sunset and sunrise, it casts beautiful colors across the sky. It's the most beautiful when the dark and light collide.

My plan for my life included working for a few years, and saving up some money. Then I was supposed to quit working, stay at home and start a family. We wouldn't be rich, but we could lead a comfortable life. My husband would go to work, and I'd have dinner ready for him and the kids when he got home.

God's plan included unemployment, brain injuries, being broke. He shattered my plans, and took away all hope I had for the future.

But now, my life is better than what I had pictured. We are learning to be content with what we have. We have a new appreciation for life, and a level of intimacy with God that I didn't know was possible.

And He has renewed my hope. Jeff is better now and we have the possiblity for a family again. It may not be the way I pictured it, but the possibility is there again.

I have a purpose to my life. I have always had purpose, but I didn't know what it was before. Through this journey God has taken me on, I have learned my purpose. God gave me a story to tell. He gave me a powerful testimony, and formed it into a book.

He gave me the ability to share my story in a very public way, sharing my hope with others.

I have a joy that is indescribable. It is an incredible feeling to not only have a purpose in life, but to know what it is, and be able to live it out everyday.

I may not be able to understand why God chooses to allow suffering in my life, but He does have a plan. He also knows me better than I know myself.

He knows what can make my life better than anything I can even imagine. He knows my desires better than I do. He can take me down paths that I never would have chosen for myself, but turn out to better than anything I would have known to ask for.

While I may sometimes wish I could plan out my life, wish I could understand God's ways, I'm so glad I don't. God is so much bigger than anything I can even begin to comprehend, and I am grateful that I can't fit Him in my little box.

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